Gender Discrimination and Employment Decision: A Study of Selected Banks in Kano State, Nigeria

Abstract

The inconsistency in the previous studies have stirred up serious controversies concerning gender discrimination in the money deposit banks  (MDBs), when it comes to employment decision in the northern region of Nigeria. The objective of this study was to examine the effect of socio-cultural norms on employment decisions in the selected MDBs in northern region Nigeria. The descriptive research design was employed because the study involved eliciting the opinions of some employees in the banking sector. A sample size of 150 respondents from selected banks were purposively selected. The R2 value of 0.862 on Univariate linear model indicated that no fewer than 86.2% change in employment decision is caused by a unit increase in gender superiority, sex discrimination, gender educational difference, culture and religious, which were collectively termed as the attributes of socio-cultural norms in the study area. The variance was highly significant as indicated in the F-value in the corrected model  (F=156.087 and P < 0.05) and all the six (6) proxies of socio-cultural norms were significantly related with employment decision at 5% level. The directions of impact of these socio-cultural norms over employment decision were all positive, except gender discrimination, which reveals that women received less opportunity than their male counterparts. This invariably has negative effect on the employment decision in the selected  banks. It was recommends that Nigerian governments at all levels should liaise with traditional rulers and other stakeholders to ensure that all harmful and traditional practices, which affect only women, should be eradicated.

Keywords: Gender, Discrimination, Employment decision, Cultural, Norm, Religious, Kano metropolis